What working at a sex shop has taught me

There’s something about the cold that lets you know that there is change in your world about to happen. It always happens in October. One way or another, things will change in that month. My melancholia will sink into the desperate plea of harvest time forgiveness. I had started out doing customer service and my good senses that people were crazy, the world was crazy and maybe- just maybe if I moved professions, I’d find clarity and maybe make better money.

I’ve never been so wrong in my life. With each new vocational choice, came with a smaller staff and even smaller exposure to customers. Each new job raised me up a tier in cash and I had hoped to widen my perspective one things .These adventures of employment were never about the money and by the end of it they were never worth the money either.

 But with each new experience, came a delightful buffet of new stresses and horrors that I had thought I had escaped.  I was mentally tormented by some of the things I had seen in my line of work. The one thing I learned was a good poker face and calm voice could get you out of anything and hide your true feelings. However, outside of work silence began to eat my world. It started slowly by missing calls here and there but before I knew it, I was a ghost in my own world.  There was one truth that held stronger than steel. One room in my apartment was the safest place in the world and if I stayed there I would be safe. The only thing that was safe was that lie I told myself about safety because you were never safe. Even in your own mind, you were never safe.

Eventually we had parted ways and I was relieved to be among the unemployed. There wasn’t enough money in the world that could replace the parts of myself that had been burned away in the heat of EMS and toxicity of the people around me. I should have never left customer service. I was a super star at it and now, could I even make eye contact with people anymore? Did I even know how to talk to anyone anymore? I’d barley left the house in outside of work in years. I felt judged by eyes I would never see, discriminated against by people who never even knew my name and lost in the seas of justified indifference.

No. I steeled myself against an uncertain future. I had the choice in this. My future, my choices, my world. The person that could take that away from me would be me and no one else. In this path I would have to fight back and this time, It would be on my terms. I walked into the mysterious sex shop. I viewed it as the darkened dungeon of desire that was struck a blaze in the passionate darkness. I’d always wondered what it would be like to work in one. 

Heck, I’d taken classes on sexual psychology and helped many people out with their questions about sex before. I could do this. Also, if I could talk to people about dildos, I could talk to them about anything.  An extreme measure to rid myself of agoraphobia and silence but I was always the type to jump head first into things.  

I was greeted with a warm smile with a glimmer in her eye. It was not just a glimmer but an impressively vast amount of information. She had tattoos and slightly askew jewelry that matched well with sharpened wit that sparkled with each pun. I felt an instant comfort in finding a kindred soul. For the first time in ages, I saw able to talk normally and without the shadow of fear. I’d gathered my poker face and asked for an application to attach with my resume.

Before I knew it, I was employed. I got to know the staff that worked there. For the first time in years, I felt okay again. I bonded with each employee and nothing was off limits. There is a comfort in knowing that there is nothing is off bounds for discussion. We talked about everything from porn titles to gaming. I also learned that despite my schooling I knew absolutely nothing compared to what was actually out there. 

I spend hours looking over industry magazines, reviews and manuals.

 Manager was educated to the point where material sciences, chemistry and physics of everything in the store along with the laws were a part of her core being. I call her my sensei because no one in the world had taught me more than her. Working here was like rehabilitation for the soul. I began to connect with people again. I was able to speak, make eye contact and grow back into the person I had always been.

My approach was simple. Create a safe environment in which no one was judged. I could help create a place where they felt open to discuss there real thoughts and feelings without being discriminated against or judged.

I never realized before how much sex was like a Jugen shadow in our everyday lives. Once it’s out of the room we are all human again but then again maybe it’s out humanity that is brought out in our human sexuality.

People ask me about the creepy people but the fact of the matter is that there really wasn’t any. If anything, they were the most polite, well spoken, civilized people that I ever had the honor of helping. I had maybe four grand total of people who made me uncomfortable out of hundreds. If some people even sensed that another customer was stepping over the limits, they would stay to make sure I was safe. I never worked in a safer environment.  I was free to what I pleased, help as I saw fit and had ultimate freedom in my work.

I viewed my work much like mechanics. I sell parts and some companies are better than others. Also, I sell maintenance equipment like lube, cleaners, and filters. Take the actual names that we have for our products and I’m practically an O’reillys sales associate.

The bottom line: What did working at a sex shop teach me? Everything I needed to know about being my own person again. Everything I needed to know about how the world works because once you peek in the underwear drawer of the human id, you will know how the world really works.